“Struggling Young Mother” Evidence Does Not Establish Murder Motive

The New Jersey Supreme Court has overturned the murder conviction of a single mother for the 1991 murder of her son.

The charges were not brought until 2014.

The trial witnesses mostly agreed that Lodzinski was a loving mother who worked hard to care for and support her young son. Lodzinski’s sister Linda and babysitter Danielle Gerding both stated Timothy was her “life.” As the sole provider for Timothy, Lodzinski held a number of different jobs during Timothy’s childhood. She worked as a secretary, a paralegal, a receptionist, a bank teller, and in retail. At times, she held two jobs at once. As with many single mothers, securing childcare was a struggle.

The basis for reversal

The State offered motive evidence to suggest that Lodzinski had a reason to kill her son and to impute to her the requisite state of mind to commit murder, urging the jury to find that Lodzinski purposely or knowingly killed Timothy because she “was a young struggling mother” and “Timothy was a social burden.” But most witnesses did not question Lodzinski’s devotion to Timothy or suggest that she was anything but a loving and caring mother. It is not uncommon for a twenty-three-year-old single mother, raising a child on her own, to have financial and social challenges. That singularly unremarkable scenario hardly indicates a motive to murder one’s child. The Court has rejected the very  type of generalized class assumptions offered to the jury as a motive to commit a crime. See State v. Mathis, 47 N.J. 455, 471-72 (1966) (holding that the State cannot present as a motive for robbery that a person may be poor or unemployed). That a person is poor does not mean that he is inclined to commit a robbery; that a single working mother is the sole support of her son and dating, or even having difficulty in her relationships, does not mean she is inclined to murder her child. Stereotypes associated with single-parent women cannot substitute for an absence of evidence relating to an essential element of the offense of murder.

The was a dissent that found sufficient evidence of motive citing as one of several supporting factors

evidence of motive through testimony that defendant, raising her son with no financial
support from his father, had difficulty finding adequate child care, maintaining a job, and
establishing a stable relationship…

The qoutes are from the court’s headnotes. (Mike Frisch)